


Kings

by extremesoft



Category: Formula 1 RPF, Motorsport RPF
Genre: Aftercare, Angst, D/s, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Ohhhh Boy, Painplay, Porn with Feelings, Spanking, but with a twist, it's 3 and 33 back at it yet again!, very briefly mentions alcohol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-09
Updated: 2018-11-09
Packaged: 2019-08-20 18:10:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16560767
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/extremesoft/pseuds/extremesoft
Summary: What he’s in need of is suddenly pure and utterannihilation.





	Kings

**Author's Note:**

> So. Yes. Uh. I actually have no idea where I pulled this from, but. Daniel putting his fist through a wall after the USGP was... apparently inspiring, yes.
> 
> (Unreasonable amounts of tea and herbal infusions went into writing this :D)
> 
> Now I don't know if this is something to warn about, but I'll say it anyway: in parts, this text handles physical pain in what can feel like quite an intense and detailed way, and although this isn't about self-harm or actual violence or bloody gore or anything like that, it can still feel quite... explicit, or unnerving. So if the subject is something you feel uncomfortable with, for whatever reason, then please don't push yourself to read my increasingly questionable ramblings, okay? Yes? Good :3 And if you do go on to read this, I sincerely do hope you enjoy, let me know if you did! :) :)
> 
> (PS: and let me know if you notice something that still needs tagging!)

Daniel is intoxicated by hurt more than anything else.

It’s not lack of trying that keeps him from being intoxicated by anything else - he knows he is being pathetic and he feels like the lowest of all lifeforms when he rummages through the selection of the minibar in search of beer and the feeling of redemption. He sits on the floor next to the minibar with two long since opened and emptied cans next to him, having moved on to the small bottle of red wine and wondering whether he should still make use of the cognac and the vodka and whatever he can fucking find and whatever his money can buy, anything, everything. It’s not a solution and it’s not something his trainer would recommend as wholesome and healthy means of getting rid of anger and frustration and negative feelings in general but oh Jesus fuck it, whatever, he craves the feeling of feeling absolutely nothing. The drinks have pleasantly blurred the edges of his limbs and re-designed the twists and turns of his mind and it’s a promising start, absolutely -

but the feeling of redemption is not included in the minibar menu and Daniel sure knows it, and he hasn’t taken a gulp of the wine after the first four.

 _Besides_ , he thinks and sends one of the two empty cans rolling across the floor with a sharp movement of his knee - and even the beer can seems to be able to go further than his fucking car -, he has been given his share of promising starts only to have them all go to shit. With the current trend of things not going anywhere near his way, he could probably down not only the wine but also the cognac and the vodka and the bubbly and then move on to the hotel bar downstairs and stay there until dawn only to feel nothing but slightly queasy at first and then have it followed by the worst hangover known to man nevertheless.

 _Fuck this shit_. The back of his right hand is still throbbing with a sharp ache from having been put through the wall of his driver room and he feels all the lower and lesser when the pain jolts in waves up his arm and pierces through his head, from one temple to another.

A nice feeling in a way, though. The ache. Makes him feel like he has broken at least something all by himself, out of his own will and with the power of his own hands, instead of having something breaking with he having no say in it, with him having been stripped of his last bits of control.

Max is intoxicated by racing more than anything else. He reeks of sweat and champagne and it would feel like a thoroughly disgusting mixture of rotten and sour smells were sweat and champagne not the two things he has reeked of in some of the highest points of his life; so he smells bad even after having changed his clothes and doesn’t give a crap about it. He returns from the battlefield with his boot broken, clutching the second place trophy in his other hand like a winner’s and a bottle of Carbon in the other and he is walking on air, on a cloud of disbelief and euphoria. The adrenaline and elation have pleasantly blurred the edges of his limbs and re-designed the twists and turns of his mind and it’s a promising start, absolutely -

until he lays his eyes on the door of Daniel’s room on his way to his own and he gets hit by a forceful pang of compassion.

He is all about being insatiably hungry for success, triumphing over his competitors and conquering the world he is living and breathing from the first corner to the last, and that’s what he feels like he has done today, but Daniel- oh God, Daniel. There is no way around how much Max cares for Daniel and how Daniel’s pain resounds in him as well, and Max’s hunger may border on and change its shape into bloodlust at given moments, but Daniel- oh God, how vividly Max can still bring back the moments when they have reeked of champagne and sweat  _together_ , and how far from a disgusting mixture of rotten and sour smells it has felt when they have tasted the bubbles and the invincibility on each other’s breaths and teeth and tongues. And Max aches to live it again, aches and longs.

He stops behind Daniel’s door for a moment, wonders whether he should try and say something, or knock - or use his own key since Daniel has of course given him the spare one earlier, like always - but decides not to, not just yet. He doesn’t want to be the one to rub it all in even by accident, still distinctively smelling of podium celebrations and holding both the trophy and the champagne bottle in his hands. He scuffs past Daniel’s door and stops to open the one right next to it, balancing the souvenirs from his latest conquest on one arm.

Max carefully places the trophy and the bottle on the desk. Daniel closes the small bottle of wine and places it on the floor, next to his shin. Max removes his clothes, only the rustling of them breaking the silence, and heads to the bathroom. Daniel lays his right hand on his thigh and then stops to stare at his reddened, scarred knuckles. Max turns the shower on. Daniel can just barely hear the faint whooshing sound through the wall. Max turns the shower off. Daniel still stares at his reddened, scarred knuckles and lets the ache radiating from them lull him. Max puts a t-shirt and boxers on and then flops on the sofa. Daniel gets up.

Max has given his spare key to Daniel like Daniel has given him his, and Max doesn’t have to message Daniel to say anything - to let him know he has returned to the hotel, to declare how sorry he is, to invite Daniel over, anything. He’s on his phone when he hears the quieted  _thud_  of the door next to his shutting and then he hears the sharp  _click_  of his door being opened; he is looking at the screen but sees nothing, and when he lifts his gaze to Daniel he can’t help thinking that at that moment he sees something that’s reduced almost to the point of nothing as well.

He instantly gets up to meet Daniel at the door and wraps his arms around him the second the door closes and the walls conceal them from the outside world. Neither can bring themself to say a word for neither has any; they stay there intertwined, listening to the sounds of each other’s breathing and heartbeats and feeling the warm ripples of exhales and inhales on each other’s shoulders.

Then Daniel opens his eyes again, fills himself with his surroundings - other than the comfort of Max's touch and the fresh scent of soap on his skin - and his darting gaze catches the coldly glimmering trophy and the dark, stained champagne bottle standing on the desk. And he’s struck by an overpowering storm of everything at once; sincere, loving pride in Max’s achievements and joy for his joy - immeasurable agony and frustration about his own spiral of misfortune - anger about everything slipping through his fingers time and time again, falling faster and faster and smashing on the ground beneath his feet.

A hunger raises its head in him, raw and ugly in ways but full of indescribable beauty in others.

“You’re a king, you know that?” he whispers against Max’s collar bone and slides his hands down Max’s back to place a tight grip on his hip, digging his thumbs deep in the softer hollows. “You’re a fucking king.”  
“I’m sorry”, Max sighs into the skin of Daniel’s throat as he sketches a trail of kisses from below Daniel’s ear to the nape of his neck. He knows what route things are most likely going to take from there, and he has already moved on to fumble Daniel’s trouser button and zipper open. “I’m sorry.”  
“No, don’t”, Daniel gasps and rakes his teeth over Max’s jaw, takes a slow step forward and makes Max trail his path and follow his rhythm; he guides Max to where they both please and Max is inclined to obey. “Don’t be sorry. Don't waste your time on that.”

There exist underlying patterns to their comfort sex, recurring shapes of needing and giving and taking. It starts out as something that follows the lines of  _habitual_  - Max lets Daniel take charge and Daniel is willing to do so, vaguely thinking that this must be what he is looking for, like so many times before, and desperate in his chase for an outlet. And roughness is nothing new to either of them. The hunger is in Daniel’s hands and moves when he blindly searches for the hem of Max’s shirt, pulls it over Max’s shoulder blades and and tosses the shirt somewhere on the carpeted floor, it’s on Daniel’s lips and in his teeth when he catches Max’s mouth with his own again, bites his lower lip, wolf-like, and downs him on the bed. Max binds himself with a certain amount of surrender, goes with the flow of Daniel’s need to lead - but it doesn’t make him want any less when he feels Daniel’s demanding palm on his cock and instinctively rolls his hips up to meet the touch, waves of heat and pleasure crashing to the brims of his body and turning his breath into moans and gasps. He spreads his legs further, giving himself for Daniel to use in which way he wishes, anything to make Daniel able to pull himself back to the surface once again.

What deviates from their existing patterns and recurrences is Daniel gradually turning  _hesitant_. The dance of his hand grows sluggish and his fingers falter and come to stop right above the waistband of Max’s boxers. Max opens his eyes as the realization that something’s not in its rightful place sinks in; they meet Daniel’s, a sudden thoughtfulness sits in the darkness of his gaze - and somehow Max instantly feels like they are not touching each other at that moment, not truly. Something about Daniel is still out of his reach, intangible, even though Daniel is right above him and Max echoes the way his muscles flutter, torn with want and yet withdrawal.  
“Are you okay?” asks Max, confused and out of breath and clutching to Daniel’s forearms as Daniel supports his weight on both hands again.

Daniel bites his lip, glances briefly down at Max’s chest to avoid his eyes. Immeasurable need as well as unexplained shame cut him once he stills and finds himself wishing that Max’s grip on his arms was tighter, and tighter still, fingertips drilling through the muscles there and crushing his bones to dust. Perhaps he shouldn’t speak, perhaps he should keep the sphere intact and continue taking it out on Max by taking him, claiming whatever Max can give and whatever Daniel can get out of him.

But it's not what he’s in need of now, not in the end. What he’s in need of is suddenly pure and utter  _annihilation_. And Max- oh God, Max is the only soul in the entirety of the vast universe in front of whom Daniel can truly and unconditionally break to pieces and then be rebuilt. And Max is the only soul in the entirety of the vast universe who Daniel can ask to  _make_  him break to pieces and then rebuild him.

“I just thought-”, he starts and meets Max’s eyes again. What a strange and foreign situation it is that he's in now, they are flush against each other and almost fully disrobed, hard and ready yet Daniel suddenly feels unsure about how exactly to proceed. “I think you know that I… I put my hand through the wall between our rooms earlier today.”  
“Yeah, I… noticed”, says Max - there had been a gaping hole in the wall separating their driver rooms when Max had got there and he hadn’t been able to stop himself from grimacing as it had caught his eye, feeling so endlessly helpless and imagining the depths of both the strength and the pain settled in Daniel’s body. He had stood there for a while, staring at the broken wall and instinctively flexing his fingers, opening and closing his fists again and again.  
“It hurt like hell”, continues Daniel, searching for words while outing them, shit, it would be so much simpler if Max could read his thoughts and do his bidding without him having to try and find a way to voice it. “Not right at the moment, I was too full of adrenaline, I guess, but later… It sort of sank in. And my hand’s been hurting like a motherfucker all evening.”  
Max stays silent and calm, lies in wait of Daniel’s next words, next move, lets every letter float through the air between them and fall on him like snowflakes.  
“But the weird thing about it is that it’s-”, Daniel says, so weary he sounds almost dreamy now and Max understands him. “It feels kinda- nice, y’ know. At least it’s something I inflicted on myself instead of it just… happening to me.”

In Max’s head Daniel slams his fist through the wall over and over and over again with a  _crack_  and cuts and bruises and ache and Max still understands him.

“I want you to make me hurt even more, Max”, Daniel whispers after a moment of quiet, exhaustion and infinite despair shadow his voice. “I want you to make me feel as much pain on the outside as I’m feeling on the inside.”

The hold Max has of Daniel’s arms lightly loosens, like the muscles and joints in his fingers had malfunctioned. It’s as if his whole being had twitched at the words, mind swaying with the inevitable rush of images; and his expression is suddenly tinted with something not far from sheer marvel.  
“I don’t care how you do it”, Daniel continues, on the verge of begging for Max to make him feel vibrant and ablaze again. “Do anything, anything you want, just… please, I need  _something_.”

Max’s face betrays nothing, and Daniel loves it and fears it to some extent, Max’s impeccable ability to  _hide_. Max doesn’t flinch, doesn’t gasp in horror, doesn’t wordlessly ask  _what_  or  _why_  with widened eyes and a gaping mouth. His cool gaze darts over Daniel’s face, silently probing the edges of his expression and gauging the depth of his will, and his mouth is sharp and serious before he opens it.  
“And you’re absolutely sure about what you’re asking for?”

And it’s not about Max doubting Daniel and reading too much into the place he is in, the abysmal pits of hopelessness he has been cast into. He isn’t trying to tell Daniel to calm down, sleep it off and see if it all looks better in the morning when it sure as hell doesn’t if it’s not dealt with in any way. No, it’s about love and trust like time and time again, touching their limits and breaking them together like they have done time and time again. Daniel knows that as well, and a fierce flood of thankfulness rushes through him and settles in the bottom of his gut as he nods.  
“Yeah”, he answers quietly and bows to kiss Max, stays there and breathes against his chin. “I just need... something to make me feel like I’m  _alive_. And- I understand if you can’t, it’s probably a bit messed up again, but… do you think you could do it?”

The black void that is Daniel’s gaze blissfully pulls Max under and he moves a hand to lightly cup Daniel’s cheek. They have been doing this long enough; and the ways may vary but the heart of it is unmoved. Max nods in his turn, stern as ever and unconditional in his affection. He still understands.  
“I can. If you want”, he says, his fingertips run along Daniel’s jawbone. “If you really want.”  
Daniel answers by closing the distance between their mouths once more, the touch divided in tenderness and wantonness, and Max is eager to respond, clasping Daniel’s right arm tighter again.  
“Let me think for a moment”, he gasps as soon as the kiss breaks. “About how we can do it.”

There were many pleasant ways in which Max thought he could be wasting the evening after having survived the race - tasty food in a fancy restaurant, maybe a couple of beers in some dimly lit bar, retreating to one of their rooms, his or Daniel’s, to spend the night together, share their wins and losses and spirits and flesh. One of the ways he thought he could be spending his time was  _not_  trying to suddenly come up with ways to make Daniel feel physical pain within certain limits of reason; sinking deep into thinking of what he could do to achieve that and whether there’s something in the hotel room he could use.

He’s as methodical and driven in weighing the options open to him as he is in every aspect of his sheer existence. He tries to visualize using his bare hands but it seems coarse and unfitting - using his fists could cause real and severe bodily harm in addition to mere bruises with all the muscle power behind them, and were there to be only bruises, memories in blue and purple, there would still be no way of hiding them well enough, not from their physicians at least. Slapping feels somehow cheap and ineffective, it’s something out of mundane pornography. He thinks of  _pain_  as a word, of what would cause a human being pain, other than blows both physical and mental - pins, needles, blades, shards of glass  _the champagne bottle_  no, nothing like that. Daniel is still looming above him and Max stares into Daniel’s eyes; and they remind him of the velvet of the bottomless night that's taking a hold of the world outside of the one only they inhabit.

Then his eyes fly wide when he thinks of the contents of his suitcase and remembers one item, singles it out from between the piles of jeans and t-shirts and washbags.  
“I have a belt”, says Max quietly, like he’s somehow unable to believe what he’s suggesting himself.

Daniel’s expression holds yet inexplicably flares and changes. He stays put and silent for another moment and then nods, his curls shift and the joyous bounce of them doesn’t match the circumstances at all.  
“Yeah, go”, Daniel says and rolls off Max, settles on his side and follows Max with ardent eyes. Max gets to his feet and walks up to his suitcase, and Daniel intensely studies the movements of the sharply outlined muscles of his shins and thighs, thinks about the momentum hidden in them; and an irrational thought about whether Max would be able to crush his sternum to fragments with a knee between his pectorals and well-aimed pressure presents itself to him. Max crouches, finds the belt quickly and returns to Daniel. It’s such a non-specific belt for non-specific purposes. Black, yielding leather meant to be paired with an exceedingly expensive tailored suit yet now destined to be paired with Daniel’s honeyed skin.

“I love you so much, Max”, whispers Daniel under his breath as he watches Max unhurriedly uncoiling the neat roll he has made of the belt and that has sat in his suitcase almost forgotten. “You okay with this?”  
An inkling of warmth spills in the corner of Max’s mouth, almost like a small smile. “If it’s what you need, I’ll do it”, he says, strong and straightforward - oh, he really would do anything. “On your stomach.”

Daniel turns face down and slowly curls his fingers around fistfuls of the white sheets. The clinical smell of detergent fills his nostrils and he turns his head to be able to breathe more freely; his left cheek rustles against the blanket and his eyes land on his reddened, scarred knuckles once more. He stares at them but it's like his body had forgotten about the earlier ache, as if the anticipation of what’s to come had somehow soothed it. And it frustrates him. The unwilled absence of the external pain shifting his attention from its internal counterpart makes him almost angry. Soothing is the last fucking thing he’s in need of right now, for Christ’s sake; he isn’t healed yet, the feeling of redemption wasn’t included in the minibar menu and  _fuck_ , he has to find it somewhere, some kind of salvation, a way to move on from the unbearable nothing and numbness he is right at the moment.

He feels the edge of the bed bending and Max settling above him, Max’s firm legs on both sides of his own, shackling him to place. Max’s every movement is calculated and careful and it sends shivers shooting through Daniel; Max lowers himself to sit on the backs of his thighs, the warmth of him radiates against Daniel’s arse and his familiar weight makes Daniel feel somehow _secure_. Max leans forward and slides his palm up along Daniel’s back as if drawing a map of it for himself as he goes, making notes of the arches of the muscles and the grooves on the edges of his bones.  
“I love you too”, he says when he bows closer to the shell of Daniel’s ear and places his hand on the mattress, right next to Daniel’s chest. “Do you want me to count?”

Ten is the number that first comes to Daniel’s mind, of course, a nice, round, clichéed number to count whiplashes to; but there’s another one that has caused him more pain than he thinks Max’s belt ever could, even if Max managed to split him in half with a single powerful stroke of it.  
“Seven”, Daniel says, voice strained and crackling, coming out with slight difficulty and then encountering the bedclothes. “Make it seven. I’ve had seven DNFs this season. One for each, yeah. Don’t count out loud. I won’t.”

Max’s fingers tighten around the black leather like his insides tighten at Daniel’s words. Oh  _God_ , Daniel.  
“Okay”, he says, as much to himself as to Daniel; and he straightens himself, gives the belt one more testing tug with his left hand. It feels like he’s holding liquid steel in his palm, obedient yet merciless, and Daniel is soft, pliant bronze underneath him. He sees Daniel’s grip on the sheets tightening already, the white ridges of his knuckles and on the backs of his hands shimmer through the skin.

Daniel roars into the blanket at the first forceful

_smack_

of the belt against his back - the bright white agony tears its way through him and it tears him to fragments - it hurts so much that the shockwave forces the air out of his lungs, it denies him his breath - it hurts so much that it puts him out and yet re-ignites him. The sting shoots across his back like a flame; and Max watches from above him, the sounds of the cry and the slash ring in his ears and he follows as a red glow spreads from where he has struck.

_Smack_

and Daniel’s whole body convulses along with his scream and goes rigid and then languid underneath Max, his fingers furl and unfurl around the sheets and his breathes run through him harsh and violent. The pain doesn't make Daniel see stars but endless blackness instead, it takes him to the edge of an abyss and forces his eyes open, fixes his gaze onto it before reeling him and throwing him in, letting him fall, fall for eternities.

_Smack_

and Max feels he’s overcome, almost in a foggy high from something that resembles the earlier feeling of invincibility. He keeps the count, of course, he would never forgive himself if he was to lose that; but Daniel’s back still doesn’t have tattoos and Max feels like Daniel has kept the space void of ink for him, wanting Max to tattoo him with not black lines and explosive details but pain and understanding, to mark him as his own. Suddenly Max becomes very aware of his own strength, it flashes to him how much muscle power there is behind every lash of the belt and what unimaginable acts he would be capable of with it.

_Smack_

Daniel’s body is red and striped with fire and there is a blaze in the roar he sinks into the blanket, the hot flood of air returning to him. The sheets and the fabrics soften Daniel’s cries yet it still occurs to Max whether the commotion they’re making is heard in the hallway or in the neighbouring rooms, whether the melody that is the snaps of the belt and Daniel’s hollering and gasps plays itself to the outside world. It’s a dim and distant thought, a grey shadow in a trap of his mind, and then it occurs to him how little it matters to him.

_Smack_

the fifth mostly hits Daniel’s shoulder blade and the leather meeting bone instead of muscle paints his voice with yet another layer of agony, the pain somehow hollow and all the more striking there. He has no sense of the limits of his own limbs anymore, of where he ends and where Max begins, and he could weep because of how much he is feeling, how vivid he is and how he is nothing but a mixture of dizzying sensations anymore - the lashes of the belt burning him to ash - his own inescapable arousal tightly confined against the mattress and damp against his thigh -

_smack -_

his love for Max, so deep he could look up from the bottom of it without his eyes ever catching the flickering specks of light filtering through the waving surface - his own hot tears forcing themselves out of the corners of his eyes and smearing his cheeks and the blanket. He is living and breathing, he is a being of flesh and bone and soul, Max makes him break to pieces and then rebuilds him with every kiss of the black leather on his back.

_Smack._

_Seven._

Max stills, lets the belt slowly drop next to him on the bed but stays in place to marvel at the markings on Daniel’s back, artwork done with the blood that rushes madly under Daniel’s skin and with the desire piercing through them both. He reaches to touch, spellbound, the softness under his fingertips radiates and glows with heat, red and golden. Max is more aroused than he could have ever pictured. His boxers feel wet and cling to him, it feels so unimaginably filthy and he wants it.  
“Daniel”, he says, hoarse, the name is thick and bears the taste of champagne bubbles on his tongue. He places a hold just below Daniel’s rib cage, as gentle as he can, runs his right thumb along the mellow curve of his side. “Can I?”  
“Yeah”, Daniel answers from the edges of his ability to get air inside his lungs, quick and choked. He would come undone if Max  _didn’t_. “Please.”

Max rises to his knees and shifts backwards, slightly clumsy with fervour but still firmly anchoring Daniel’s legs to place with his own. He digs his fingers in Daniel’s hips and pulls him closer with a forceful move, like testing the limits of his own physique yet again; seeing how far he can take and mold Daniel with his hands, Daniel who is so beautiful underneath him, shining and bent. Daniel grunts against the blanket and braces himself on his elbows, arms trembling with the strain and boiling adrenaline. He stares in the face of danger, stripped and spent, and feels no dread, none at all.  
“Do you still want it to hurt?” Max asks quietly, bending down once more and breathing the words against the stripes on Daniel’s back, placing a light kiss on one of them.  
“Yeah”, says Daniel again, still just barely breathing. The touch of Max's lips on his back is stinging torture and grace as such. “All the way.”

Max goes with it and yanks both their boxers down, exposes Daniel to the fullest with one impatient move of his hand. And he can’t help gasping as he touches himself at last; he is slick and wet already, his palm drenches and glides along his own shimmering length with little effort. He knows that he is still going to make Daniel howl with yet a different kind of pain from the lashes of the belt; but there is no room for finesse and gentleness now, no fingers, no mouth, no tongue, nothing like that. And it’s strange, really - how he has thought for such a long time that he loves Daniel so much that he would never hurt him, yet now he is willing to take Daniel fully apart in any painful way, with the power of his own hands and with every ounce of strength in his body,  _because_  he loves him so much. He shifts to line his cock with Daniel’s crack and bucks his hip to grind against it as if feeling about, testing, asking; and Daniel pushes back to rut against Max like begging for it, wordless and desperate.

“ _Please_ ”, Daniel whispers against the sheet, tasting the tanginess of his own tears in his voice.

He lets out a growl and a torn sob against the bedding yet again when Max claims what's offered - the blunt-edged pain of the intrusion travels all the way up along his spine and makes two halves of him - yet it’s nothing but heavenly bliss in the end, the way Max makes him feel so  _whole_  when he completely splits him. Max stills for a moment, not even halfway in. Daniel shakes to the rhythm of his own gasps below him and Max feels an almost overpowering need to wait for it to calm and lessen and to let Daniel grow more compliant around him. It’s an instinct, it comes from somewhere deep within him. But it isn’t what Daniel has wished from him; and Max puts a fierce, bruising grip on Daniel as he continues to go until he’s all the way in. Until Daniel is full, until Daniel is complete, until Daniel is freed. Daniel wails, willingly accepts what he has asked Max to give him, and there is saltwater, ocean sprays, in the corners of his mouth and nose.

Max jerks his hips back and then forth again despite Daniel still clenching around him, it’s so slow and almost tedious at first; but it gets easier with every move of his, and they find a rhythm and they find new patterns and shapes of needing and giving and taking. The hurt in Daniel steadily makes way for heat, the jabbing agony makes way for arousal. There’s lust now in place of lamentation; and Max keeps completing Daniel, not only with his body but with his whole being, with the affection and trust they share and all the different forms it takes.  
“Max”, Daniel gasps, suddenly struck with the need to say the name, say it out loud despite being short of air to the point where the rims of his vision sway and swim, say it like a choked and ragged declaration of love, again and again. “Max, oh fuck-  _Max_.”

Sparks ignite in their bodies and grow into flames that lick a path up their legs, embers turn into a fire that erupts in the pits of both their innards. Max feels his climax starting to build up down in the darkest of his depths, the pinches and twinges in his shins and the peaks of heat in his gut him pave the way for his pinnacle. He reaches to coil his fingers around Daniel, Daniel is throbbing and burning, Max's fingers instantly get soaked and it just serves to drive him closer to the precipice.  
“I love you”, he whispers, somehow almost managing a complete sentence before losing his breath once and for all. “ _Fuck_ , Daniel-”

Max is still the first to come, the shocks shake and twist him and he buries himself inside Daniel with a powerful thrust and a roar. He takes Daniel to the highest of peaks and Daniel follows him up there, soaring, up, up, no longer feeling pain and hurt but fiery want instead; and Daniel follows him down as his own orgasm drowns him in its all-powerful waves, plunges him underwater and fills his lungs until everything is sapphire and black. He spills over Max's fingers and on the sheets so hard it almost aches in itself, his very breathing pulsates and wavers. He would twitch at Max still stroking him a few more times after he has already come but it's like his muscles didn't have enough strength left for even the most basic of reflexes, and he trembles so violently that he would have already collapsed on the bed if it wasn't for Max still holding him up, hands still gripping his hips, yet to retreat from his warmth.

And when Max does so, he leaves Daniel with a momentary emptiness once more, an odd quiver of chill and loneliness wafting through his edges. A passing quiver, nothing more; Daniel loses his balance as soon as Max’s hold of his hips loosens and he falls on the bed, shaking and gasping for air and trails of salt and wetness on his jaw. Max lays down next to him, half on top of him, anywhere as long as it is as close to Daniel as he can get, closer still in what feels like a desperate attempt to merge their bodies into one. He holds Daniel to his heart, their chests are a mess of heat and glowing sweat and tears, oh,  _tears where there should be champagne_  thinks Max, helpless to stop it. Daniel doesn’t sob or whimper and the complete lack of the harsh, hopeless sounds somehow makes his cry all the more harrowing in itself.

It’s not for long, a quiet moment of breathing in and out; Max dares to make his fingertips float on Daniel’s back from time to time, for seconds and fractions, and Daniel’s skin as well as his breathing wince and waver but he’s not trying to escape the touch. He grows softer and the last of the restlessness in him wanes and ceases to clench him. Max keeps stroking his hair, caressing the back of his neck and his temple.  
“I’m sorry”, Daniel whispers and moves to gently place his hand on Max’s neck.  
“No, don’t be sorry”, starts Max in an imitation of Daniel’s earlier words before Daniel can say anything more; and he can’t help a small smile when he leans to brush Daniel’s cheek with his lips and says "don’t waste your time on that."

Daniel lets out a  _mhm_  that’s almost like a tentative, fragile laugh. He looks up at Max, slow and eyes gleaming with water and weariness but still somehow…

 _alive_ , thinks Max once more,  _sparkling_ , and the thought of having been able to light a fire in Daniel again moves his core with immeasurable force.

“Are you okay?” Max asks - an instinct as well, the question comes from somewhere deep within him, deeper than his brain and vocal chords. “Did I hit you too hard?”  
Daniel nods lazily. And it's not an explicit answer to anything, but Max follows the prance of his curls and feels his insides slither with uncertainty.  
“It was a lot”, Daniel says, keeping his gaze fixed on Max's. “A hell of a lot. I asked of you a lot. But… I think it was exactly what I needed.”

Max feels a shadow of a burn behind his own eyes when Daniel whispers  _thank you_ , or rather sighs, and to Max it feels like a summery breeze; the two words bounce off his Cupid's bow and vanish into the warm air when Daniel leans in and Max meets his mouth with his own. There's sweetness and calm now on Daniel's lips and in his teeth in place of hunger, and Daniel finds he now craves the soothingness of the touch.  
“I love you, Max”, Daniel says against his jaw once they part, quiet but headstrong. “And I'm happy for you. I'm disappointed and fucking pissed for myself, but… it can't and it doesn't stop me from being happy for you. I said this already but you're a king. You conquer.”

It isn't customary for Max to be so completely lost for words, being stubborn and sharp first and foremost and having practiced shielding himself with those two qualities for all his life - but now he lies beside Daniel and doesn’t know what to say to him at all.

“I heard you going to the shower earlier, y’ know. When I was sitting there, just me and my patheticness”, continues Daniel before Max gets to even trying to open his mouth, exhausted and with a glimmer in his eyes. “And I thought for a moment… about coming here and telling you not to shower just yet.”  
A ghosting smile tints his features, bittersweet and barely there but dawning in his gaze, and it makes Max’s heart both warm and weighty, sheer overflow of emotion.  
“Because”, Daniel continues, “I thought that if there’s no other way for me to taste the champagne with you again, up there on the podium and all… then let me at least taste it on your skin.”

Max lays his hand on Daniel’s cheek and wishes he could give Daniel the world.  
“You’ll get there”, he says. “You called me a king, but I think you’re that just as much as I am. We’ll get there.”

Max gazes into his night sky eyes for one silent moment and then whispers  _stay here_  like Daniel, with his devoured strength and trembling muscles, would simply rise and run if Max didn’t hold on to him. He gets out of the bed slowly, limbs unbelievably heavy with fuck and afterglow and love, and goes to grab the champagne bottle from the desk. The thick, dark glass is smudged and messy and a confusing contrast to the brittle softness of Daniel’s arches against his skin.

Daniel follows with a keen, curious look as Max returns with the bottle in his hand and stops to stand next to the bed. Max glances at Daniel, makes sure he is watching before he raises the bottle to his lips; and Daniel watches on, stares like helplessly bewitched. There’s something so achingly bittersweet in how he finds himself yet again looking at Max downing champagne and yearning to taste it himself that for a moment he does imagine getting up and ripping the bottle from Max’s hands -

but Max places it on the nightstand himself after taking one long gulp and suddenly Daniel understands that it isn’t a display of dominance.

“Taste it”, Max says as he gets back on the bed, coils his arms around Daniel and his fingers deep in the black of Daniel’s hair. “Taste me.”

It’s a display of devotion; and as Max kisses Daniel again, tender like the curve of his backbone and yet burning with the fire of a thousand whiplashes, Daniel tastes the champagne in Max’s mouth, and Daniel is intoxicated by Max more than anything else.


End file.
